Part 46 (2/2)

”So he left us. And when we offered him some pistolets he smiling said, 'He must not be twice paid for one labour,'

meaning, as I take it, that he had salary sufficient of the State for his service. For (as I after leaned) they call an officer that taketh rewards, twice paid.”

So next morning the people landed from the s.h.i.+p, and Bacon goes on to tell us of the wonderful things they saw and learned in the island. The most wonderful thing was a place called Solomon's House. In describing it Bacon was describing such a house as he hoped one day to see in England. It was a great establishment in which everything that might be of use to mankind was studied and taught. And Bacon speaks of many things which were only guessed at in his time. He speaks of high towers wherein people watched ”winds, rain, snow, hail and some of the fiery meteors also.”

To-day we have observatories. He speaks of ”help for the sight far above spectacles and gla.s.ses,” also ”gla.s.ses and means to see small and minute bodies perfectly and distinctly, as the shapes and colours of small flies and worms, grains and flaws in gems, which cannot otherwise be seen.” To-day we have the microscope.

He says ”we have also means to convey sounds in trunks and pipes, in strange lines and distances,” yet in those days no one had dreamed of a telephone. ”We imitate also flights of birds; we have some degrees of flying in the air. We have s.h.i.+ps and boats for going under water,” yet in those days stories of flying-s.h.i.+ps or torpedoes would have been treated as fairy tales.

Bacon did not finish The New Atlantis. ”The rest was not perfected” are the last words in the book and it was not published until after his death. These words might almost have been written of Bacon himself. A great writer, a great man,--but ”The rest was not perfected.” He put his trust in princes and he fell. Yet into the land of knowledge--

”Bacon, like Moses, led us forth at last; The barren wilderness he pa.s.sed, Did on the very border stand Of the blest promised land, And from the mountain's top of his exalted wit Saw it himself and shew'd us it.

But life did never to one man allow Time to discover worlds and conquer too; Nor can so short a line sufficient be, To fathom the vast depths of nature's sea.

The work he did we ought t'admire, And were unjust if we should more require From his few years, divided twixt th' excess Of low affliction and high happiness.

For who on things remote can fix his sight That's always in a triumph or a fight.”*

*Abraham Cowley, To the Royal Society.

You will like to know, that less than forty years after Bacon's death a society called The Royal Society was founded. This is a Society which interests itself in scientific study and research, and is the oldest of its kind in Great Britain. It was Bacon's fancy of Solomon's House which led men to found this Society.

Bacon was the great man whose ”true imagination”* set it on foot, and although many years have pa.s.sed since then, the Royal Society still keeps its place in the forefront of Science.

*Thomas Sprat, History of Royal Society, 1667.

BOOKS TO READ

The New Atlantis, edited by G. D. W. Bevan, modern spelling (for schools). The New Atlantis, edited by G. C. Moore Smith, in old spelling (for schools).

Chapter LIV ABOUT SOME LYRIC POETS

BEFORE either Ben Jonson or Bacon died, a second Stuart king sat on the throne of England. This was Charles I the son of James VI and I. The s.p.a.cious days of Queen Elizabeth were over and gone, and the temper of the people was changing. Elizabeth had been a tyrant but the people of England had yielded to her tyranny.

James, too, was a tyrant, but the people struggled with him, and in the struggle they grew stronger. In the days of Elizabeth the religion of England was still unsettled. James decided that the religion of England must be Episcopal, but as the reign of James went on, England became more and more Puritan and the breach between King and people grew wide, for James was no Puritan nor was Charles after him.

As the temper of the people changed, the literature changed too.

As England grew Puritan, the people began to look askance at the theater, for the Puritans had always been its enemies. Puritan ideas drew the great ma.s.s of thinking people.

For one reason or another the plays that were written became by degrees poorer and poorer. They were coa.r.s.e too, many of them so much so that we do not care to read them now. But people wrote such stories as the play-goers of those days liked, and from them we can judge how low the taste of England had fallen. However, there were people in England in those days who revolted against this taste, and in 1642, when the great struggle between King Parliament had begun, all theaters were closed by order of Parliament. So for a time the life of English drama paused.

But while dramatic poetry declined, lyric poetry flourished.

Lyric comes from the Greek word lura, a lyre, and all lyric poetry was at one time meant to be sung. Now we use the word for any short poem whether meant to be sung or not. In the times of James and Charles there were many lyric poets. Especially in the time of Charles it was natural that poets should write lyrics rather than longer poems. For a time of strong action, of fierce struggle was beginning, and amid the clash of arms men had no leisure to sit in the study and ponder long and quietly. But life brought with it many sharp and quick moments, and these could be best expressed in lyric poetry. And as was natural when religion was more and more being mixed with politics, when life was forcing people to think about religion whether they would or not, many of these lyric poets were religious poets. Indeed this is the great time of English religious poetry. So these lyric poets were divided into two cla.s.ses, the religious poets and the court poets, gay cavaliers these last who sang love-songs, love- songs, too, in which we often seem to hear the clash of swords.

For if these brave and careless cavaliers loved gayly, they fought and died as gayly as they loved.

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